Poetry
כוכבים בחוץ
Not translated into English
Nathan Alterman · 1938
Synopsis
A passer-by discovers the world as if for the first time: the road, the suburb, the city and its objects, love, which each poem meets like a person. The pieces, rhymed and strongly scanned, express wonder at creation and, in the same breath, the sense of death lying in wait. The first poem, which opens with the words “The melody returns once more”, has remained one of the author's best known; another, “Endless Encounter”, gives the book its title through the image of the stars left outside.
Context
Alterman assembled these poems into a cycle by their common motifs: he wanted them read as a single poetic world, in which each piece takes its meaning from its place, and not as isolated poems. Most were unpublished; he had given almost nothing to the journals for more than two years. The book was published by Yahdav, the house of the group of young modernists gathered around Shlonsky, and immediately made Alterman the dominant figure of his generation. The poet Nathan Zach later made it the target of a severe critique.
Who it is for
A collection of rhymed poems in Hebrew, with no French or English edition; it is read as a single whole, in the order the author intended.
Prizes and reception
His best-known and most admired book, reprinted seventeen times up to 2016; several of his poems have become songs.
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